If you dug Gears of War for what it was - and hey, it was a great shooter - move along. Nothing to see here. If, however, you need a little context for your button-pressing, and were left cold by the first game's hole-riddled story, read on! Kudo Tsunoda, from Microsoft, has said that the team working on Gears 2 are aware of the first game's narrative shortcomings, and are working super-hard on fleshing things out for the sequel:

Whether it's the development of the story or the additions of the new characters, there'll be a lot more for everybody to enjoy out of the whole story experience.

Hey, who knows, with Josh Ortega (who has written for comics like Spiderman, Batman and the KOTOR prequel for Dark Horse) on writing duties, who am I to argue. A love interest could be exactly what Marcus needs at this stage in his life.